Ongoing U.S Police Brutality and Corruption Discussion Thread

http://inthesetimes.com/article/19813/doj-to-address-defective-accountability-system-chicago-must-renegotiate-pol/

https://www.buzzfeed.com/albertsamaha/blue-lies-matter?utm_term=.rw3EnMdoGl#.sk5lAz32G7

survey of ~60 incidents checking police statements against video evidence

https://www.whitehouse.gov/law-enforcement-community

welp

probably the single most frightening thing I read today.

we go from a White House demanding accountability from police forces to one that basically tells them "do your job by whatever means necessary".

great.

Our job is to make life more comfortable for parents who want their kids to be able to walk the streets safely.

fuck you

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/midwest/ct-indiana-protest-bill-20170118-story.html This isnext level bs.

Also, they're planning to cut the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services. I have no idea how effective this office is, but I looked up its granting programs. The largest fund is for hiring community oriented police.

surprise surprise: dude who shot 5 men at a protest encampment is friendly with cops

http://www.startribune.com/officer-testifies-that-he-exchanged-racially-charged-texts-with-accused-protest-shooter/411680846/

A Burnsville police officer testified Tuesday that he exchanged racist texts with Allen “Lance” Scarsella, the man standing trial on felony assault and riot charges in the shooting of five Black Lives Matter protesters.

Bret Levin said he was friends with Scarsella since high school and the two stayed connected after Levin joined the Mankato Police Department.

In 2015, Levin said Scarsella frequently sent him “racially charged” text messages, and that the texts were “negative about black people.” When asked if he replied with similar texts, Levin replied, “Yes I have.”

“How we were talking was more along the lines of locker room talk,” he said.

ahh just a bit of fun lads

prepare to see gifs of this film in right wing social media for the rest of the decade:

http://variety.com/2017/film/news/mel-gibson-vince-vaughn-police-brutality-movie-dragged-across-concrete-1201975594/

Gibson and Vaughn will play cops who are suspended when a video of their strong-arm tactics gets wide attention. They then descend into the criminal underworld to exact vengeance.

fuck anyone for working w Mel Gibson but I gotta admire his beard game, I must say

from my post a week ago:

https://twitter.com/StarTribune/status/826922833196544002

#BREAKING: Allen Scarsella guilty of assault, riot in 2015 protest shooting of five in Minneapolis http://strib.mn/2kTTISc

btw https://theintercept.com/2017/01/31/the-fbi-has-quietly-investigated-white-supremacist-infiltration-of-law-enforcement

What the actual fucking fuck is this http://www.kentucky.com/news/state/article134722264.html

An Eastern Kentucky police department has drawn praise from local residents and questions from others in the commonwealth for featuring the phrase “Blue Lives Matter” and the Punisher skull on eight of its vehicles.

The Catlettsburg Police department, which employs eight full-time and two part-time officers for a population of about 2,500, features the images on the hoods of its 2013 and 2017 Ford Interceptor sedans and sport-utility vehicles, assistant police chief Gerry Hatzel said.

The vinyl decals featuring "Blue Lives Matter" and the Punisher logo were created in Louisiana and affixed to the Catlettsburg Police Department vehicles.

The stylized skull is from “The Punisher” comic book series.

The designs were spearheaded by Police Chief Cameron Logan, who worked with a vinyl decal shop in Louisiana to get the decals printed. Logan installed the decals on all the police vehicles in December. He would not discuss how much the decals cost.

Read more here: http://www.kentucky.com/news/state/article134722264.html#storylink=cpy

http://www.kentucky.com/news/state/ra9xta/picture134722249/ALTERNATES/FREE_960/punishercar3

Hope Disney sues the fuck out of those fascists.

(So weird to realize that Disney currently owns the Punisher.)

If any corporation would sue over this, it is Disney. They issue 'cease and desist' letters by the crate load.

They also used to make genuine logos for the government in-house - all those WW2 squadron insignias with Donald Duck in them and stuff.

tone deaf to the point of madness

That's fucked up

LOL, well, that lasted a whole day: http://io9.gizmodo.com/kentucky-police-remove-punisher-logo-from-cop-cars-afte-1792720736

Cool, so now we can shift the full weight of our attention back onto the offensively vile Blue Lives Matter 'hate crime' aspect of this story.

guy i knew in high school liked to pretend he was the punisher and went as frank castle for halloween. he is now a cop.
so strange that outsiders obsessed with vigilante justice become police, there should be a study

Cops often get away with enough shit that, if they're so inclined, they can essentially be paid vigilantes with the weight of the law behind them. It's like the best of all possible worlds.

few weeks old, but https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/08/magazine/the-preacher-and-the-sheriff.html?_r=0

depressing as hell

too on the nose

The only person I knew growing up who became a cop was a sadist who enjoyed torturing and brutalizing people. It was kind of sad, he started out as a sweet kid, but he was adopted by creeps, and I met him through this gang of punks I hung out with during my wayward youth. I'm sure he's getting his justice now...

Becoming a cop in the US grants you unlimited power over life and death over other human beings with barely any repercussions. Pretty good deal if that's your thing. Not everyone's like that, but if you are like that, I can only imagine it's a dream job.

ICYMI

Benjamin Kunkel‏
@kunktation
Darren Wilson admits that Mike Brown never tried to grab his gun:

http://www.theroot.com/everything-you-think-you-know-about-the-death-of-mike-b-1793261221

very much not into the article starting with "Here is the story of Michael Brown’s murder that we all believed" - um NO we did not believe this BS for a minute, fuck you

but that's a side story to the new information which of course is totally enraging and exactly what i expected. there are no words for this murdering scumbag.

on a related note, from a few days ago:

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/11/us/michael-brown-ferguson-police-shooting-video.html

In the two and a half years since Michael Brown, a black 18-year-old, was shot and killed by a white police officer in Ferguson, Mo., the explosive case has been parsed in intricate detail. Witnesses offered varying descriptions of the fatal encounter. Investigators examined bloodstain evidence on the street where Mr. Brown died. And the police released a security video from a nearby store that showed Mr. Brown pushing a worker and taking cigarillos minutes before the shooting.
But a second, previously unreported video from that same convenience store included in a new documentary is raising new questions about what happened in the hours before the shooting on Aug. 9, 2014.

The footage shows Mr. Brown entering the store, Ferguson Market and Liquor, shortly after 1 a.m. on the day he died. He approaches the counter, hands over an item that appears to be a small bag and takes a shopping sack filled with cigarillos. Mr. Brown is shown walking toward the door with the sack, then turning around and handing the cigarillos back across the counter before exiting.

Jason Pollock, a documentary filmmaker who acquired the new tape, says the footage challenges the police narrative that Mr. Brown committed a strong-armed robbery when he returned to the store around noon that day. Instead, Mr. Pollock believes that the new video shows Mr. Brown giving a small bag of marijuana to store employees and receiving cigarillos in return as part of a negotiated deal. Mr. Pollock said Mr. Brown left the cigarillos behind the counter for safekeeping.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eqmnyD8dri8

search function is down so I couldnt hunt for the LA thread, but this works too

http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-baca-verdict-20170314-story.html#nt=oft12aH-1la1

down goes baca

the theory that Brown paid (in some way shape or form) for the cigarillos was put forth before the trial I think and it got next to no traction. kind of infuriating to see that yes, this is likely what happened and despite people picking up on it nobody was willing to entertain that the dude didn't strongarm rob the place. y'know even tho the owner seemed to be suggesting he didn't call 911.

I rather suggest everyone read this

https://www.buzzfeed.com/melissasegura/detective-guevaras-witnesses

"The attorney general of the United States believes that minority citizens need to be controlled by whatever means necessary, to coin a phrase. The Department of Justice now has the back of every rogue cop in the country. Old times there are not forgotten."

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a54291/jeff-sessions-consent-decrees/

yeah fuck jeff sessions. I just wish being pro police brutality and extrajudicial summary executions by cop was actually hurtful in elections in every state in this country.

http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/charles-kinsey-was-shot-after-a-north-miami-cop-called-halt-it-is-a-toy-9254204

sad

Eugene, a veteran City of Miami cop who had been sworn in as chief only six days before the Kinsey shooting, says training was lax and infighting rampant.

"The scene was a mess, to be honest with you," he tells investigators of the Kinsey shooting. "People were walking all over the place. Thank God (Kinsey) did not die. I realized I have a problem with the training of my staff. We're talking about some 15- or 16-year veterans, but in North Miami, a 15- or 16-year veteran may have less experience than a two-year cop in Miami."

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/14/us/georgia-police-officer-fired.html

this happened in the county where i grew up. it was 90% white when we moved there and is 39% white today

http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/02/us/texas-cop-kills-teen-trnd/index.html

should also be crossposted to the 2017 race thread

Jesus fucking Christ. We're just making zero progress with this shit. And most likely moving backwards, if Sessions has his way.

Goddammit

Justice Dept declines to prosecute Baton Rouge officers over Alton Sterling murder.

Attorney General Jeff Sessions, everybody

guess what
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/06/16/minn-officer-acquitted-of-manslaughter-for-shooting-philando-castile-during-traffic-stop/?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_pn-castile-407pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory&utm_term=.e5df7ec69756

fuck

Over and over again.

this whole legal rationale whereby a cop "feeling threatened" justifies murder has to be systematically dismantled

this whole legal rationale whereby a cop "feeling threatened" justifies murder has to be systematically dismantled

I meant this

Here is some background on the law. New standards are needed. #blacklivesmatter #PhilandoCastiile pic.twitter.com/6N88RiJiDM

— ACLU National (@ACLU) June 17, 2017